The Virgin Birth B

Now listen to me, if Jesus had had no human parents, then He wouldn't have been man at all.

On the other hand, if Jesus had two human parents, He could not have avoided the contamination of humanity. So He had to be the child of man and yet the child of God and that's exactly what He was. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur.

I'm your host, Phil Johnson. He healed the sick, He gave sight to the blind, He rose from the dead. With all that Jesus did to prove that He is the Son of God, did He really have to be virgin-born to save you and me from our sin? What is the significance of that part of the Christmas story to our salvation? John MacArthur, Chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary, answers those questions as he continues his current study on Grace to You titled The Birth of the King. So grab your Bible or open the Study Bible app on your mobile device and turn to Matthew chapter 1 and follow along.

Here's John MacArthur with today's lesson. Open your Bible with me, if you will, to Matthew chapter 1. Matthew chapter 1. We come to verses 18 to 25 and these verses deal with the virgin birth of Jesus Christ. Matthew begins his gospel by considering Christ and it's a very important passage. Let me read it to you.

You follow along as I read. Now the birth of Jesus Christ was in this way. Then as His mother Mary was espoused to Joseph before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Spirit.

Then Joseph, her husband, being a just man and not willing to make her a public example was minded to put her away privately. And while he thought on these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife, for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. And she shall bring forth a son and thou shalt call his name Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. Now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet saying, behold, the virgin shall be with child and shall bring forth a son and they shall call his name Immanuel which being interpreted is God with us. Then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the angel of the Lord had bidden him and took unto him his wife and knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son and he called his name Jesus.

Now let's look at five features, five distinct elements appearing in the narrative. First of all, point number one, the virgin birth conceived, verse 18. The virgin birth conceived.

This miracle is so incredible that I hope you haven't heard it so often that your senses are dulled to the spectacular, unbelievable supernaturalness of this thing. Verse 18, now the birth of Jesus Christ was in this way. When as his mother Mary was espoused or betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found with child by the Holy Spirit.

Now we'll stop there. Now here you have the virgin birth conceived. Here the Spirit of God through the writer Matthew tells us that Mary was impregnated by the Holy Spirit. In all of human history there had never been a virgin birth.

When people saw an unwed mother, there was only one conclusion, that's all, except in this case. There was another conclusion, the Holy Spirit. Nothing new for the Holy Spirit in this sense. Jesus was always a work of creation, wasn't He? In Genesis 1 He brooded over the emptiness and the nothingness and He created everything.

In Acts chapter 1 He moved upon the situation of people gathered in the upper room and He created the church and why shouldn't He be able to create the marvelous miracle of the virgin birth? And don't be shocked. Don't be shocked.

We should have expected it. Really. Go all the way back to the first book of the Bible, the third chapter of Genesis. Chapter 3, verse 15, I will put enmity or animosity or antagonism or hatred.

It's the word for enemy, really. I will put...make an enemy between thee and the woman. Now watch, between thy seed and what?

Her seed. He shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel. He said, look Satan, some day there's going to come a woman and that woman is going to have a seed and you may bruise his heel, and he did at Calvary, but he'll do what?

He'll bruise your head. And you notice that it says that Jesus would be the seed of the woman, her seed. Only one time in the history of the world did a woman ever have a seed. Seed is in the man, but once in the woman. And that's what Genesis 3, 15 said.

And Paul says in Galatians 4, 4, he said, in the fullest of time Christ came. Watch this, made of a woman made under the law, made of a woman. Now listen to me.

Now get this. If Jesus had had no human parents, then He wouldn't have been man at all. He wouldn't have been partaker of our flesh. On the other hand, if Jesus had two human parents, He could not have avoided the contamination of humanity. So He had to be the child of man and yet the child of God and that's exactly what He was. He was born of a sinner and yet He was sinless because He was equally born of God. Deity canceled humanity's curse. The water of the nature of God drowned the fire of the nature of man. So the virgin birth conceived.

Second point. The virgin birth confronted. What about poor Joseph? He doesn't know what's happening.

His little world has just come to an end. Joseph a just and righteous man, no doubt deeply committed to Mary, waiting with anticipation today when they both are proven during the period of betrothal and can come together to consummate the marriage. What about Joseph? Verse 19, then Joseph her husband.

Notice he's called a husband even though they were still in the betrothal period. Being a just or righteous man and not willing to make her a public example was minded to put her away privately. Now all of a sudden we see the virgin birth confronted. Joseph has to confront this thing. He has to face it and the miracle is just very, very unclear to him.

He doesn't understand it. He was jolted and he was a just man and he didn't want to make her a public example. To call him a just man puts him in the same class with Zacharias and Elizabeth because the Bible says that they were righteous before God, walking in all His commandments and ordinances, blameless. It puts him in the category of Simeon of whom the Scripture says he was righteous and devout. He was a real God-fearing Jew and he knew that he had to be obedient to God's laws and God's laws say when somebody does that, they are our consequences. Joseph was a true saint. So his first prompting came from his righteousness but his second prompting came from his concern and it says he was not willing to make her a public example.

Now he had that option. Two courses were open to Joseph in this day and age. Had he been living in the day Deuteronomy was written, they would have required one thing but the laxness of the Jewish view of the theocracy, the laxness with which they kept the law of God had brought it about to this point where they had substituted less stringent laws for the ones that God had ordained and that's why their country got into so much trouble because they violated God's laws which were preventatives.

And here in this lax day, there were two things open to Joseph. One was to make her a public example and this is how they did it. He would charge her openly in a public court with having committed adultery. She would be shamed. She would be brought to trial. She would be convicted in front of everybody, ruined in terms of reputation.

The other possibility was that they provided for a more quiet way. The two parties could get together before two or three witnesses and write out a private bill of divorcement such as is indicated in Deuteronomy 24 and they would write out this private little bill of divorcement. There would be no judicial procedure. There would be no public knowledge. There would be no fanfare.

Nobody would need to know. It was stated at that time that you did not even need to write the cause for the divorce in the statement so that she could go away without anybody ever really knowing what had happened. It was done secretly. Now this wasn't necessarily God's pattern but this is what was allowable in the laxness of the day in which Joseph lived. So he had those options and he said, well, I'll put it away privately. He just couldn't bring himself to making Mary a public example. He just couldn't bring himself to public scorn and public shame. So he wanted to put it away privately. But he had a hard time doing that.

He just couldn't get it to the very act. So it says in verse 20, and while he thought on these things, stop right there. No doubt he went to his bed in his own home in Nazareth.

There's still a Nazareth here. And he was meditating. And he was mulling over what he had to do. And while he was mulling it over, he fell asleep. He fell asleep. And then we find the virgin birth clarified, clarified.

The virgin birth clarified in verse 20. Look what happened. He falls asleep. He's confronted it.

It's confusing him. He falls asleep. And behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream.

Now I just want you to understand something. This is not a dream like you have a dream. This is not a dream where what you see isn't real. It's imaginary. Somehow, in some way, in a dream kind of revelation, the dream turns into something real.

It was a real angel and he really saw that angel. And by the way, this is not uncommon to Matthew. There are at least six, in fact, there are only six other times where we find this kind of communication. Matthew chapter 2 has several. Matthew, yeah, Matthew 1 here, Matthew 2, Matthew 27, and the other one's in Acts 2 17 where it's prophetic.

So this is not a totally isolated situation. God sometimes uses an angel in a dream. And Joseph wasn't dreaming it in the sense you think of it.

He fell asleep, began to dream, and his dream turned to a reality. And the angel said to him, Joseph, thou son of David. And I know why he said that second part, just to reinforce, just to reinforce the lineage and the line of David.

Boy, that must have been something to hear, thou son of David. He says this, don't be afraid to take unto you Mary your wife. For that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.

You don't have to be afraid, Joseph. That which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit. This is the great reality, people, of the virgin birth.

There was no human father. This is the birth of God in human flesh. He is both man and God. And that's why, for example, in the Old Testament he's called Zimach, which means the branch. And did you note that he is called the branch of David in one passage, and in another one the branch of Jehovah? He is the offspring of David and he is the offspring of God. Did you know in Isaiah 9, 6, he is called Wonderful Counselor, the mighty what?

God, the Father of Eternity. And so Joseph was to know that he had no fear in taking Mary, for what was conceived in her was of the Holy Spirit. And verse 21 gives him further instruction. She shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus.

In Hebrew, Joshua, Joshua, Jehoshua, which means Jehovah shall save, and his name will be Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. Now I want you to know something about verse 21. She shall bring forth a son. You notice he didn't say, And Joseph, you will have a son. To thee will be born a son. She brought forth that child, and his name shall be Jesus, for he shall save his people from your sins. You know the Bible is very careful about never naming Joseph as the father of Jesus.

I don't know if you know that. For example, in Matthew 2 13 it says, Arise and take the young child and his mother and flee to Egypt. Always a mother. Why didn't he say take your child and your wife? Why the child and the mother? Always Joseph is removed from the actual fatherhood. 2 20 of Matthew, Arise and take the young child and his mother and go to the land of Israel.

It's always the child and his mother. Never Joseph as the father, virgin born, and his name, Jehoshua, Jesus, for he shall save his people from their sins. Beloved, that's the reason he came, isn't it? And that's why the book of Acts in chapter 4 verse 12 says, Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. Only the name of Jesus, the one God-man. It is God alone who saves. Like Psalm 20 says, there are some people who trust in horses and some people who trust in chariots and some who trust in physical strength and some who trust in their knowledge and their intuition and their reputation and their prestige, their position, machinery, friends, whatever it is, education, but only Jesus can save. He shall save his people from their sins.

Only he is mighty enough to save. So the virgin birth conceived, confronted, clarified, forth. The virgin birth connected. The virgin birth connected. Just so it doesn't appear as there's some last minute afterthought, some deal grabbed out of the air like the critic said, some floating myth that was attached to Jesus, Matthew comes in with a commentary in verses 22 and 23.

The narrative breaks here. The angel isn't speaking anymore. Matthew talks.

And this is what he says. And he does this all through Matthew. In fact, 50 times in the Gospel of Matthew he quotes the Old Testament, 76 additional times he alludes to it.

And this is a formula that he uses. Now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Lord through the prophet. And whenever the prophet spoke, it was the Lord saying, and he quotes Isaiah 7, 14, Behold the virgin shall be with child and shall bring forth a son and they shall call his name Immanuel which being interpreted is God with us. There is the virgin birth connected to the Old Testament. This is not an afterthought. This is not the pulling of a legend out of the air. This is the promise of God fulfilled, a tremendous thing.

They should have knew. Now all this was done that it might be filled up, that it might be made full, that it might be accomplished just exactly as Isaiah said it. Now we could have a great big long drawn out thing about what did Isaiah say and why did he use the word Alma instead of the word Bethulah and did he mean virgin and blah, blah, blah and on and on and on.

There's no reason to argue about that at all. Suffice it to say that the word Alma in Isaiah 7, 14 is best translated virgin. Best translated virgin and the people, the critics, the slanderers can come and go and try to erase it but they can't erase the commentary of Matthew on it who used the word parthenos which meant virgin.

Matthew knew what it meant even if they don't. And it's a little tough to get around the virgin birth when it says over and over that the Lady Mary had no relationships with a man. Why do they want to argue about Alma in Isaiah 7, 14?

Why don't they listen to God's commentary on it? The setting of Isaiah's prophecy is very simple. King Ahaz was terrified that the kingdom of Judah might be destroyed by Syria and Israel. Ahaz is sitting down at the bottom of the southern kingdom and he's worried about up north there's Israel and over here is Syria and he's afraid they're going to come down and they're going to wipe out the kingly line. So he's really afraid they'll lose the kingly line. So God comes along and says, let me give you a promise. Nothing's going to happen to the kingly line.

Nothing is going to take away the kingly line. Here's a sign, a virgin shall be with child and that child will be Emmanuel, God with us. He says, you look down the corridors of history and there will be a virgin born child and He will guarantee you that David's line will never be broken.

And Jesus came into the world as the fulfillment of that prophecy given by Isaiah to Ahaz to show that God would keep His promise and the throne of David would never be broken forever and ever and ever and ever. By the way, they shall call His name Emmanuel, which being interpreted as what? God with us, El. The last two letters of that word are the name for God, El. El Shaddai, El Elyon, El Machaddishchim, all those names for God, El.

Ammonu means with us, God with us. Now you say, but they never called Him Emmanuel. No, that is not His title as far as a name is concerned. That is a description of who He is. And many times the title is not necessarily the name. He was called lots of things.

As well He is called Emmanuel. And so the virgin birth is clarified and then it's connected to history past. Fifthly, the virgin birth consummated, verse 24, then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the angel of the Lord had bidden him and took unto him his wife. Don't you think that was a wonderful thing? Don't you think that was the best nap Joseph ever had? When he got up and it was all clear, oh, it isn't just Mary. I'm not just marrying Mary.

I'm getting the Son of God thrown in on the deal. But he must have been a good man. Can you imagine the almighty God of the universe depositing His only Son in the home of a man who wouldn't be a good father? Can you imagine that?

I can't imagine that. I just feel bad that not more is said about Joseph. He must have been dead by the time Jesus died because He doesn't appear anywhere.

And at the cross, do you remember what Jesus did? He looked down at John, the beloved, and He looked down at Mary and He said, Mary, behold your son. And He said, John, behold your mother. And He gave somebody to Mary to take care of her.

He's going to be gone. And no doubt Joseph was long dead. We don't know much about Joseph, but oh, I imagine he was a wonderful man because I know God wouldn't deposit His one and only Son in the home of a man who wouldn't be a good loving father. And he must have been a wonderful man to deal with a perfect son. Can you imagine, fathers, the frustration of that? No dad, it's this way. When I get to heaven, two people I want to meet, Joseph and Mary.

Don't you feel that way? Bless Joseph's heart. What joy there must have been when he woke up and he took Mary. And they had the chuppah, the wedding ceremony, but not until after Jesus was born. He didn't know her until she had brought forth her firstborn son. And then he did what the angel said.

The angel said, do what? Call his name Jesus, the virgin birth consummated. They had the wedding, but he never touched Mary physically until after that baby was born. There's an interesting footnote. People always say, well, do you think they had other children? I know they had other children. The Bible gives the names of the other children. And John 7 talks about Jesus' brothers.

But there's an interesting little footnote. In verse 25, the literal Greek is, and he was not in the habit of knowing her until she had brought forth her firstborn son. And the implication is that once she had brought forth her firstborn son, he was in the habit of knowing her.

That's the rendering of the Greek. They had a normal human relationship, physically, which produced many other children. The supernatural birth of Jesus is the only way to account for the life that he lived. Somebody once asked a Christian, well, if I told you that a child had been born today in the city over there in that hospital without a human father, would you believe me? To which the Christian replied, yes, if he lived as Jesus lived, and that's the fact. At the start of his life, the Jews said Jesus was the son of a man who seduced Mary. At the end of his life, they said the disciples stole his body and faked the resurrection.

And Matthew begins with the answer to the first slander and ends his gospel with the answer to the last slander and spends the rest of the middle of it fighting all the other slanders against the dear Lord Jesus Christ. He was none other than God in human flesh. And Matthew tells us he came to dwell with the sick to heal them. He came to dwell with the demon-possessed to liberate them, with the poor in spirit to bless them, with the care written to free them from care, with the lepers to cleanse them with the disease to cure them, with the hungry to feed them, with the handicapped to restore them. But most of all, he says that he came to dwell with the lost in order that he might seek and what?

Save them. Emmanuel, God with us, infinitely rich, became poor, assumed our human nature, entered our sin-polluted atmosphere without ever being tainted by it, took our guilt, bore our griefs, buried our sorrows, was wounded with our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities, went to heaven to prepare a place for us, sent his spirit to dwell in our hearts, right now makes intercession for us and will someday come to take us to be with him. No wonder the apostle Paul said through his poverty we are made what?

Rich. Well, let's pray. Father, thank you not only for the theology of the virgin birth, but for the example of what happens when God uses two simple people. May we be so righteous, so useful for that which you would do today in our world in revealing yourself. Thank you that you have chosen the weak things to confound the mighty. Thank you that we who have nothing to offer can be used by you.

What a mystery. I give you the praise in Jesus' name, amen. That's John MacArthur helping you grasp the importance of the virgin birth as John continues his Christmas study here on Grace to You, titled The Birth of the King.

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